


the reason comes

by harperuth



Series: Primacy (yelling all the way down) [3]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Prime!Ratchet, Sticky Sexual Interfacing, Transformers Plug and Play Sexual Interfacing, background Ratchet/Drift
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-21
Updated: 2019-07-21
Packaged: 2020-07-09 17:34:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19891681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/harperuth/pseuds/harperuth
Summary: "He realized that in his quick glance at Starscream’s face when he burst in he had missed one important thing...the flush of rushed energon high across his cheekbones that indicated Orion was about to be well and truly fragged."In an AU where Ratchet is the Prime instead of Orion...Megatron, Starscream, and Orion have been interfacing while being frustrated by him for about four million years.





	the reason comes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [auto_thots (towards_morning)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/towards_morning/gifts).



> So over on twitter, the phenomenal James (@auto_thots) and I were joking about an AU where Ratchet is made Prime instead of Orion, he punches god, and megastarop have weird sex while talking about him. Then we caught ourselves some feelings. Whoops. Anyway this fic is about some of that weird sex. 
> 
> More in depth (spoilery) warnings re: the dub con are in the notes at the end.

Orion was working quietly in his office when the door slammed open. It wasn’t the first time this had happened. It wasn’t the first time this had happened _today_. Orion wasn’t sure what about his door inspired so much slamming, but everytime it happened he thought he should start looking into something that slid rather than swung. 

Starscream stomped in, thankfully closing the door again. Orion caught one look at his expression and moved the datapad in front of him before, in an innumerably pre-practiced move, Starscream vaulted the desk and landed in Orion’s lap. He waited, but Starscream didn’t say anything, just faceplanted into his neck, sharp points of his denta resting against an energon line that made Orion shiver. 

“Hello Starscream,” He tried, bringing one hand up to stabilize on his lower back, while the other dropped to his thigh, “Everything alright?”

“Sparklings,” Starscream hissed. Orion’s spark jumped and his mind raced. 

“While I’m not opposed to the topic, I doubt we should start that conversation without Megatron,” Orion picked out carefully, always wary of Starscream when he was A, slamming doors, and B, hiding his face.

“Not ours you idiot,” He groaned, though the graze of lips across his wiring betrayed Starscream’s appreciation of the sentiment, “That diplomatic convoy from Velocitron arrived and there were _sparklings_ and _he picked one up Orion_! I was minding my own business! I was _working_! Then I turn the corner and there’s a baby climbing all over him! I should not have to expect this kind of-this kind of _domestic terrorism_!”

Starscream’s volume and pitch had risen through his entire diatribe and Orion carefully dialed his audials along with it. He and Megatron had once worked out the perfect settings and timings for all of Starscream’s rants. Orion tucked the “Angry/Charged About Prime” subroutine down in his processor once it was clear Starscream was done.

“I’m sorry Sweetspark,” Orion rumbled, as he idly rubbed Starscream’s back strut, then gasped, as the denta on his neck suddenly gripped with much more intent. 

“Don’t be,” Starscream purred, finally pulling back to look at Orion fully. He realized that in his quick glance at Starscream’s face when he burst in he had missed one important thing...the flush of rushed energon high across his cheekbones that indicated Orion was about to be well and truly fragged, “Or, at least, not yet.”

The kiss stole every breath from his vents, like kissing Starscream always did. Orion was a simple mech before the Revolution That Was/Wasn’t, and he had never had even a berthmate as inventive as Starscream was every day. Orion never knew what to expect when a single iota of Starscream’s attention was focused on him, just that it would probably leave him confused, delighted, and aroused in equal parts. 

“I can taste the thoughts on you,” Starscream murmured, hovering just over Orion’s lips while he panted, “You’re...hmm, yes, you’re working too hard. Let’s take care of that.”

Starscream gave him one last searing kiss before roughly shoving his shoulders back to meet the chair. He smirked when Orion shivered and leaned in to whisper in Orion’s audial, “Stay.”

Orion could do no more than whimper as Starscream slid off his lap to kneel before him, claws dragging in his wake. He was unable to rip his eyes away as Starscream expertly traced seams and wires from knee to mid-thigh, occasionally detouring to dip in or linger when a particularly strong shiver wracked Orion’s frame, before stopping and tapping the inner edge of a larger panel, “Open.”

Orion stared at him. Starscream huffed and tapped the same spot again, “Open it.”

“Open...what?” Orion asked. 

“Oh for the love of Primus,” Starscream rolled his optics and did something with his wiring that Orion didn’t quite understand, and a small catch popped open. 

“What is _that_?” Orion leaned forward to try and glimpse this _entire part of his body he didn’t know about_ , but a clawed hand shoved him up and back until he was pressed back into his chair again. 

“I said _stay_ ,” Starscream growled, keeping one hand on Orion’s chest while the other fumbled with a data port on his own torso, “It’s a femoral port. What do they teach Iaconian mechs these days, honestly.”

Orion let out a soft chuckle, smiling softly when Starscream glared at him. He finally fumbled his own port open and, with a quick bit of pressure against Orion’s chest to ensure his obedience, reached down to grab the cable from his femoral port before freezing. Orion didn’t dare move as fine tremors ran through Starscream’s wings. 

“You didn’t know about this port,” Starscream gasped, and Orion realized he was laughing. 

“No,” Orion agreed carefully, grinning as Starscream dropped his head to his knee and _giggled_. 

“Which mean you never got it upgraded.”

“Oh,” Orion said and Starscream shrieked a new laugh. Orion wasn’t an old mech persay, but he certainly had an old frame-type. When he had first fallen in berth with Megatron and Starscream it had become apparent that none of his cables were compatible with the others’, so he had gotten them upgraded. Apparently, not all of them. 

Starscream hitched a few ex-vents, before straightening up and rubbing his hands up Orion’s thighs a few times, his wings still trembling slightly, “A hitch, of course, but one I can work around.”

He pulled a small cap out of his subspace, placing it on the end of his own cable, before smirking and plugging it into Orion’s port with no warning.

“Ah!” Orion offlined his optics at the sudden surge of pure _Starscream_. When Megatron did this, it was usually a tidal wave of data. An onslaught so broad and absolute that it was like driving into a wall at top speed, and Orion could do nothing but be washed away in the torrent. Starscream _flowed_. He would pick his way in like lightning from the distant acid storms, spreading himself out thinly, but with purpose, as he picked through pathways at an exponential rate. 

When Orion had first met Starscream, vorns and vorns ago, he hadn’t understood just how much the mech was thinking at any given time. There was some evidence, the twitches across a face still unaccustomed to hiding, the fluttering wings that weren’t still even in recharge, and the way that nothing could knock him off balance. Orion didn’t realize that he was usually operating on his twentieth plan at any given time until the day he saw Starscream beat Prowl at Fullstasis. Prowl had been shocked, but Starscream had merely given a small smile, shook the hand offered to him, and walked away. Orion had caught Prowl staring at the board in disbelief several hours later.

Orion felt Starscream pick his way around the edges of the memory files and twitched his armor out as, at the same time, he pulled at a process that sparked a quick zip of electricity up Orion’s back struts, _and_ sent two simultaneous thoughts across the link, ‘ _such kind thoughts about the idiot sparkling i used to be_ ,’ crashing and overlapping with, ‘ _i’ve only got the one cap so this is a one-way street you outdated lug_.’

‘ _You were brilliant,_ ’ Orion pushed across his processor first, unable to multitask the way Starscream did, then, ‘ _You like my frame otherwise,_ ’ pulling up file after file of Starscream clinging to him, scratching his plating, _begging_ to be held down and filled up-

‘ _yes yes_ thank _you,_ ’ Starscream batted the files back down, other parts of him zipping through Orion’s processor too quickly for him to track, ‘ _primus do i really make that face when we-_ ’

He cut himself off and Orion stopped the snicker that wanted to escape, but Starscream still felt it. His presence quickened, seeping into all the spaces that existed in between the parts that were _Orion_. It was being filled in the most interesting and complete of ways, every pathway he took was encased in Starscream. There was no longer any space left in him, because Starscream was _there_.

“Optics online,” Starscream purred, and Orion struggled to pull himself up and into awareness of the rest of his body. It took a couple tries to find the right processes, but eventually he managed, blinking down at Starscream blearily, “Keep them on.”

Orion prodded the process at the nearest vein of Starscream to it, shrugging when red optics whipped to meet his, teasing, “You said I was working too hard.”

He groaned at the sheer burst of heat that sizzled through the parts of Starscream that were seeped through his entire processor. Starscream leaned up and forward, capturing Orions’s lips in a searing kiss, optics bright as he pulled away, “You remember the signal.”

“Trion,” Orion managed to grumble, pulling up a memory file that Starscream tucked away just as quickly.

“Yes,” Starscream briefly flared with annoyance, not at Orion, he knew, but at the potential to end all fun the ritual of checking in on the signal risked. It had happened before, but Orion could never settle on anything else to latch onto in the few moments of panic that would happen where he needed things to stop. He knew how Starscream felt about the fact that being put in situations where Orion was panicked and desperate for things to end immediately brought him to thoughts of his old mentor. Sad. Protective. Furious enough to restart the Revolution That Was/Wasn’t.

Orion made sure to bare his love and appreciation for Starscream and Megatron’s care for him across his processor to flush the lingering feelings threatening to turn this all south. Starscream huffed and pushed his presence forward, as if he was rolling in the feeling, ‘ _you’re very close to ruining the Mood i’m trying to create here, soft-sparked fool._ ’

Orion grinned, “If there was a mood at some point I think we’ve long passed it.”

Then, his vocalizer was no longer his own.

‘ _i’m sure that it can be brought back,_ ’ Starscream pushed again, prodding at him until armor flared up and Starscream could dip claws and tongue underneath to tease at sensitive protoform. Orion couldn’t pull away, unable to even squirm, as the sensations swept through him. It was almost too much. Almost.

Starscream was _everywhere_. Both over and underneath and every part of him. Orion tried to track his movements but eventually gave in to what Starscream clearly wanted, sinking into the sensation of being completely overtaken, letting the growing charge sweep over his body. 

He fought back to a little bit of awareness in his processor when he felt the panel covering his array open. Starscream asked, gently for him, ‘ _okay?_ ’

‘ _Mmm_ ,’ Orion rumbled, struggling to connect back into any sort of thought beyond just feeling, ‘ _Yes, okay_.’

Heat once again sizzled through the parts of him that were Starscream and he moaned softly, his vocalizer having been gifted back to him.

“Wanna hear you,” Starscream mumbled, nuzzling at the newly exposed valve in front of him, already glistening with lubricant. It shined across his faceplate when he pulled back to say, “Know how much you love this.”

Starscream dropped all pretense then, giving Orion’s valve a long lick, teasing the anterior node at the top for a moment before dropping down to plunge his tongue and fingers into his valve. Orion dropped his jaw and vented reapidly, letting out a whine as the sensitive nodes at the roof of his valve were expertly stimulated, made all the more sensitive by Starscream’s clever manipulation in his processor. 

Orion could feel himself cresting to an easy first overload when the doorknob rattled and time froze. 

Shock and embarrassment sizzled through his processor, and at this point he couldn’t determine if it was his or Starscream’s. In the bare second before the door opened one thought crashed across his processor-

‘ _You-i forgot to lock the door_.’

With the reflexes of a naturally born Vosian invading his motor function, and Orion’s own tactical prowess, they managed to launch themselves forward. Orion made sure to hook Starscream’s weight on his pedes before sliding the chair up, effectively hiding him under the desk. He had a datapad in his hand, Starscream still _in his valve_ , and the best innocent expression he could muster schooled on his face when the door slammed open, bouncing off the wall.

He really needed to look into that sliding door thing.

“I’ve broken the Primacy,” Ratchet announced, walking in and dropping into one of the chair’s opposite him, rubbing a hand over his optics.

Orion was still thinking about doors, and trying _very hard_ not to think about _Starscream still being inside him_.

‘ _in more ways than one_ ,’ Starscream snickered, and pressed his tongue up into a particularly sensitive node.

Orion froze, hips twitching forwards before he could stop them, optics locked on where Ratchet was thankfully not looking at him.

‘ _i know what he’s doing_ ,’ Starscream said, finally withdrawing his tongue but leaving his fingers in Orion’s valve, nosing at his anterior node, ‘ _i can see what you’re seeing. give the signal and i stop, but i promise i’ll be careful_.’

Memory files flashed through Orion almost too fast to see, some he brought up on his own, others pulled by Starscream. File after file of the three of them...Starscream would come tumbling into berth charged by spending time with Ratchet and demanding they sort him out, Megatron trembling and begging while Orion held him down after witnessing the lashing out of the carefully reigned in temper of the Prime, the few occasions where Orion himself had come to his two partners, whining in need of overload after watching Ratchet work in the medbay.

All flashed by in the blink of an astrosecond, only to be replaced by more files, digging into things Orion hadn’t even realized he’d remembered. Glimpses of Megatron watching, his field warm while Orion and Starscream ‘faced themselves ragged...Starscream self-servicing on the other side of the berth while Megatron gripped at Orion’s hips, keeping him balanced as he straddled Megatron’s helm.

They winked by even faster and Starscream licked softly and silently at his anterior node, ‘ _you like being watched, nasty old bot, even if you didn’t know it. give the signal and i stop._ ’

Orion did no such thing.

He cleared his vocalizer and peered at Ratchet, flashing a quick admonishment across his processor to Starscream. He cleared it again, voice catching on some static, “Broken?”

Ratchet sagged further into his slouch in the chair and groaned. Orion felt Starscream’s twitch at the sound and desperately tried to keep them on track.

“Yes, broken. Eons upon eons of tradition and I’m gonna be remembered as the fragger who broke the fragging thing,” Ratchet grumbled.

“Ah yes,” Orion smirked, the bits of Starscream flooded through his processor breaking through in his tone, “Because you’ve cared so much about the eons upon eons of tradition up until this point.”

“Shut the frag up,” Ratchet pointed two fingers at him, “You sound more like your slagging mate each and every day. I hate it. Stop it. When are you finally going to make an honest mech out of him?”

“The second Megatron proposes,” Orion smiled warmly around the canned response he and Starscream had been using for millennia. He knew Megatron’s response to the question was a long stare before walking away. 

“The very least you could all do is be decent about it, while I’m over here destroying the Primacy with my own nonsense,” Ratchet huffed.

“I don’t think decency ever served us particularly well,” Orion blinked. He and Starscream were so tangled it was hard _not_ to let it creep into what he was saying.

Ratchet snorted and rolled his gaze up to the ceiling, “It’s like Starscream is in the room.”

Orion struggled not to freeze, focused so hard on keeping his armor loose that missed the intent in Starscream before he licked a hot stripe around where his fingers were still buried in Orion’s valve. Orion renewed his struggle over freezing once more as charge zipped through his system. Not quite on the edge of overload anymore, but still up there enough to run a shiver-shock through him.

“So, how is it,” Orion said, forcing his vocalizer to remain even as Starscream continued to lap at his valve, “That you start worrying only _now_ about breaking the Primacy, and not...not say, oh, the time you punched out Councillor Halogen? Or, perhaps the time you punched out Councillor Ratbat? Were you not worried that time you punched Sentinel Prime, ripped a Key from his abdomen, then patched him up and banished him from Iacon?”

The questions proved twofold in their effectiveness in both teasing Ratchet, and bringing the charge building between he and Starscream even higher. Orion and Megatron had ‘faced for the first time after the Halogen incident. Starscream had joined in after the public shaming of Sentinel Prime.

“If they didn’t want to be punched then they shouldn’t have paraded the fragging Matrix in front of any ornery old spark,” Ratchet dismissed him, “It’s worse than that.”

Starscream stopped in his ministrations, winding his way to the front of Orion’s processor as they both leaned in curiously. Worse than the Revolution That Was/Wasn’t? 

‘ _we really should come up with a better name for that_ ,’ Starscream thought distractedly, mostly intent on what Ratchet was going to say next.

Ratchet huffed a massive exvent, still staring up at the ceiling, “I think the Matrix is wingmeching me.”

‘ _i’m going to murder him_ ,’ Starscream thought calmly, ‘ _this fragger has spent how many million years drinking and brawling and partying his way to the most peaceful and equal galaxy we’ve had probably ever, and he finally has his crisis of slagging faith because the Matrix wants to_ spike down _?_ ’

Orion couldn’t help it. He giggled. Ratchet finally looked away from the ceiling to glare at him, something Orion was all but immune to after all these years, “Were the diplomats from Velocitron that alluring, old friend?”

“You know,” Ratchet began, and Orion grinned even wider, knowing exactly where this was going, “This is all your fault. I was perfectly happy with my little clinic, a drink or two after work, staying out of the way, but noooo. My best friend had to go and fall in with a couple of no good revolutionaries and drag me to a meeting with the fragging Council who had to drag around the fragging Matrix and fragging _Primus_ or whoever the frag decided I was the right mech to bind itself to _for life_. All I got out of this was paperwork, a sore right servo, and a best friend who went and _fell into berth_ with those same two revolutionaries that went and turned him into a smartaft _brat_.”

“Of course,” Orion countered, falling easily into the same argument they had been having for vorns, “I will gladly accept your responsibility for destroying the caste system that was languishing our planet to its own inevitable death, peace slowly spreading across the galaxy, and the single most comprehensive era of public healthcare revolution.”

“I hate that word,” Ratchet countered, smiling for the first time since he had entered the office, and Orion’s spark skipped a pulse, “It was common sense, not a _revolution_.”

“One little clinic,” Orion said loftily, “As if that could make you happy after all this time.”

“ _My_ little clinic,” Ratchet scoffed, “And it could easily be worth the trade off of the number of times I’ve had to replace the finer struts in my servos because of slagging hard plating.”

‘ _is this…_ ’ Starscream interjected hesitantly and Orion nearly jumped, realizing that he was tracing around the long standing processes Orion had in place to keep his fans _off_ while talking to Ratchet, ‘ _is this really charging you up?_ ’

Orion hadn’t realized just how high the charge had been building while having this practiced and well worn argument with Ratchet. Now that he was aware, he could feel the way his valve was clenching rhythmically around Starscream’s fingers, static racing to and fro over his protoform trying to chase the overload that was perilously near. He suppressed the need to flare his armor, try to abate the heat that was building in him. He pulled up a quick memory file to shove at Starscream, a flash of a moment before he had met Megatron, Alpha Trion walking past his console in the Iacon Database with a faint air of distraction in his widely broadcast field.

Starscream immediately stopped all motion, both physically and in Orion’s processor, recognizing the warning for what it was, rather than a full stop, ‘ _what do you need?_ ’

‘ _I cannot overload while he is here,_ ’ Orion thought, unable to stop the flow of energon to his face, desperately hoping Ratchet wouldn’t notice. 

‘ _let me have some of your processes,_ ’ Starscream soothed, ‘ _i can dial this down_.’

He acquiesced. He felt Starscream burn the brightest yet from the show of trust, but while Starscream was burning, his own charge...wasn’t necessarily receding, but it became more manageable…physically. The sensitivity in his valve dialed down to the ghosts of sensation. The charge staticking across his system didn’t ground or abate, but his processor cleared, Starscream shying his awareness away. Starscream pulsed softly where he was filling in the new empty spaces of his processor, ‘ _i won’t let anything happen that you don’t want._ ’

‘ _And I’m the soft-sparked fool_ ,’ Orion thought, unable to help the love that saturated him.

All this was over in seconds, Ratchet none the wiser as far as Orion could tell.

“So,” Orion vented lightly, expelling as much heat as he dared, “Just who is the lucky mech that the Matrix has deemed so worthy of your, ah...affections?”

Ratchet hesitated, staring down at his hands where they were folded across his chassis, finally allowed a moment to rest between feverish explanations, “Do you remember...frag, this was vorns ago. Do you remember that pretty-bot junkie that came through my clinic? You were there, I know that, while I was operating.”

Orion frowned, paging through the memories of that time in his processor, but unable to pick up any files that weren’t the whirlwind first interactions of he and Megatron...the first time he saw Starscream...a few stolen moments at Maccadam’s with Ratchet, the other mech scowling and tipsy, ranting about this, that, and the other thing. Starscream’s presence in his processor melted a little around the file of their first meeting, ‘ _did you really...Primus, you thought i was-_ ’

‘ _Beautiful_ ,’ Orion supplied, when Starscream cut himself off.

“No,” Orion said slowly, frowning, “I can’t say I do?”

“He was a fragging mess,” Ratchet said bluntly, “Out of his slagging mind, body on the verge of shutdown just from the sheer substance abuse alone, never mind the malnutrition and general wear and tear of homelessness. But Primus…”

Ratchet cut himself off when Orion gasped. Ratchet might not be afraid to throw around every foul word that came to mind, he rarely if ever invoked Primus’ name. Even after all these years as Primus’ chosen, he would swear up and down that he didn’t exist and refuse to talk about him at all. The casual utterance was indicative of a Ratchet thrown totally off balance and into the past.

“Frag,” Ratchet finally said, dragging a hand down his face, “Even when he was on the verge of dying…he was the most beautiful fragging mech I had ever seen.”

Orion gaped, the emotion mirrored in Starscream. Ratchet had always seemed so…uninterested in, well, everything. Even before the Primacy, Orion had never seen him take anyone to berth. He had always been more than invested in his clinic, his friends, anything else. After...well, after the emotional fallout that was a Ratchet with a prevalent deathwish on top of eons of anger finally allowed to refract itself through his spark, it seemed that Ratchet was destined to be alone by his own hand.

Orion was always torn on whether he should be thankful about this. On the one hand, he never wanted something so bleak for his best friend. On the other, would he, Megatron, and Starscream have fallen into berth together without the temptation that was an unreachable Ratchet?

‘ _i like to hope so_ ,’ ghosted across the link, followed immediately by, ‘ _SCRAP_.’

‘ _It’s been too long,_ ’ Orion realized, ‘ _You’re going to lose control of the meld_.’

‘ _i don’t fragging think so,_ ’ Starscream spat. Orion felt him double down on the processes that were keeping Orion from the edge of overload, ‘ _i told you,_ nothing _that you don’t want will be happening._ ’

“I’m unused to such...effusion from you, old friend,” Orion finally settled on, “If you knew this mech so long ago, what makes you think the Matrix is pushing you towards it?”

Ratchet scowled again, “Stupid self important slagging sparkler in my chest. Always thinks it knows fragging best.”

“I assume this is a bad thing?” Orion asked.

“ _Always_ ,” Ratchet growled, and even with his dampened intake sensors, Orion couldn’t help the zip of charge the sound caused. Starscream was no better, whimpering in his processor, “I refuse to be a _slave_ to the will of all the fraggers screaming in my spark. They’re all aftheads Orion, do you understand? They slagging _suck_ at being normal reasonable mechs. And if they want me to jump into berth with Drift, then that’s probably the _last thing I should do_.”

Starscream jumped with curiosity at the name, but neither of them could come up with any further information, ‘ _something to look into later_.’

“But,” Orion frowned and took a moment.

‘ _We...should encourage this,_ ’ Orion thought, not quite a question.

‘ _are you JOKING?_ ’ Starscream mentally shrieked, ‘ _we ABSOLUTELY should._ ’

‘ _I know you want this for slightly nefarious reasons,_ ’ Orion offered, ‘ _But I appreciate it._ ’

“Is this something that you want?” Orion turned his attention back to his friend, “Setting the Matrix aside for the moment.”

“If only I could,” Ratchet muttered.

“Ratchet,” Orion said, “Please, be honest with me, at least.”

“Of course I slagging want him!” Ratchet exploded out of his seat, pacing in front of the door, “I’ve wanted him for fragging vorns, ever since he looked at me with unfocused optics and asked for _help_ and that makes me the most glitched mech in existence! He had nothing and here I was charged after a pretty frame and needy spark!”

“Then,” Ratchet froze, staring at the wall, getting quieter as he went on, “Then I woke up and he was _gone_ , after talking about a _relinquishment clinic_ , and the next I hear is some cryptic message about being off world. All these vorns and I’ve never forgotten him Orion. He creeps into my processor while I recharge, I’ve caught glimpses of images of him that aren’t really there, and I’ve never, _never_ given up hope that he was alive...that he would come back.”

Orion barely dared to breathe, and in his processor Starscream was quiet, awe radiating through his being.

“And _that_ ,” Ratchet finally spat, “Is why I _can’t_.”

‘ _Primus,_ ’ Starscream finally whispered, ‘ _that’s…_ ’

‘ _Yes_ ,’ Orion agreed.

“Ratchet-” Orion began, but was cut off.

“Frag,” Ratchet chuckled weakly, “That wasn’t how I planned for this to go. You always did bring out a certain honesty in me, Orion.”

“And I always said that was why you sought me out at times,” Orion offered, just as quiet, frame humming with charge at the sudden emotional honesty.

‘ _you’re such a fragging sap_ ,’ Starscream accused, but Orion knew that the sudden reassertment of charge was a combination of him losing control of the meld to let Orion’s sensitivity return to normal levels, as well as a bleed through of his own.

“Perhaps,” Ratchet hummed, “Frag. I...wasn’t supposed to detour through here. I should get back.”

“Know that you are welcome anytime, old friend,” Orion said, struggling to keep his voice even now that the combined charge of him and Starscream was starting to race across his lines.

Ratchet peered at the spot where the door had worn an indentation in the wall from being thrown open so many times and laughed, however thinly. Their combined charge jumped. Ratchet turned back to him with a wry smile, “Perhaps you should look into a sliding door solution. Hot Rod was in my bay raving about them the other day in his newest bid for an interstellar exploration craft.”

“I’ve been thinking about it,” Orion admitted, feigning glancing back at the datapad still somehow clenched in his hand, “Go. I know when you’ve tapped yourself out for your cycle’s worth of emotional vulnerability. I’ll see you tomorrow for the meeting about the Velocitrons.”

“I hate you,” Ratchet tossed over his shoulder as he opened the door, “Drinks later?”

“Maybe Starscream will indulge you,” Orion shook his head.

“Fair enough,” Ratchet shrugged, “I’ll be at the usual place, usual time.”

“I’ll let him know,” Orion said, unsure if the reediness in tone he felt was truly audible, as Starscream lost more and more control over the link and spiralled both of them closer to overload.

“I’m sure,” Ratchet smirked, and left, the door snicking shut softly behind him.

Orion waited a few tense moments, listening for receding pedefalls before falling forward, the thunk his helm made on the desk drowned out by the long low moan he finally allowed himself to release. He let the combined charge of he and Starscream wash through him, as Starscream finally lost all control on the uplink. Receptors and sensors fully onlined, and Starscream’s desperation swamped him just as all of the charge that had been held off thundered through.

Starscream desperately closed his mouth around Orion’s anterior node and _sucked_ , his fingers renewing their movement inside his valve, pressing against newly resensitized nodes and calipers. He could feel the ghost of a second motion in his valve, as Starscream’s own physical sensations made their way across the uplink. Orion spiraled closer still, picturing and feeling but unable to see the fingers Starscream had shoved into his own valve. Orion panted, the occasional whine passing through his vocalizer as he teetered on the edge of overload, unable to quite tip over after so much time spent edging up and drawing back.

‘ _please please please_ ,’ Starscream thought, unable to filter over the collapsing link, ‘ _please Primus please, so close, so close, want you first, orion please, you’re right there, overload for me please please right there overload overload gonna, oh Primus, gonna, ah, gonna, please you gotta, orion, Orioooon, for me, love,_ please.’

A private comm pinged, and Orion, so overwhelmed by his own desperation doubled and magnified by Starscream’s, accepted and opened it without thinking. 

It was a message rather than a live link, thankfully. The words flashed through his and Starscream’s combined processes.

 **Next time you engage in a little office dalliance,** Ratchet’s message read, **Remember to lock the door...and that your desk has a half a megafoot gap at the bottom. Give Starscream my regards.**

Orion couldn’t have stopped what happened next if he tried.

He stuffed his fist in his mouth and yelled as overload crashed through him, shorting out nearly every non-major process he possessed, leaving him curled over the desk, rutting forward into Starscream’s hand and face as he chased every bit of overwhelming pleasure he could. He cried out anew when Starscream’s own overload crashed back through his processor, causing his valve to clamp down again on the fingers inside it. 

He groaned when the nodes inside where stimulated anew, too soon off the heels of his initial crash, and a smaller overload raced through him, a pale echo of the pleasure currently wrecking Starscream based on what was saturated through his processor.

Each new wave from their individual overloads lashed back and forth over the collapsing link, chasing them in circles as they seemed to shake and moan through minutes on end.

The circular supernova finally came to an end as Orion shifted forward too far into Starscream’s warm mouth sucking desperately on his anterior node, and his perch on his chair veered from precarious into unmanageable. He managed to convey his sudden shock across his processor and Starscream was able to pull his mouth and fingers away as Orion crashed to the floor. Gyros still trying to reset from the strut-melting overload and it’s feedback, Orion lay sprawled half under his desk, legs akimbo and boxing Starscream in.

He barely felt his lover slowly recede from his mind before unplugging the cable and leaving him alone in his processor. Starscream navigated the ungainly mess that was his shins and knees to slide up and sprawl across chassis, idly playing with a windshield wiper.

“Are you okay?” Starscream finally broke the silence. Orion recognized the tone, trying to play of concerned with carefully constructed boredom.

“I’m concerned that you may have overdone it,” Orion said honestly. Starscream looked up at him, chin digging into chassis, emotions playing subtly across his face. Orion smirked, “That may have been the best frag I’ve ever had and I’m not sure you can top it.”

Starscream narrowed his optics, somehow able to coordinate his limbs to drag his lips to Orion’s audial, “Frag the Prime. If I knew that it only took a little edging...well, I can achieve an even better effect with Megatron bound next to you, able to _look_ , look and see how desperate you beg, but not touch, dragging myself through your processor to keep you on the edge of overload for _cycles_.”

Orion was shocked he managed a glimmer of static after the overload he had just experienced, but a full shiver of charge zipped through him. He knew Starscream felt it from the way his face shifted into a smirk. 

“Promises, promises,” Orion teased breathlessly, but his valve clenched at the thought of _Megatron_ watching him, but not touching.

“I told you,” Starscream said loftily, “You like being watched. Nasty old bot.”

**Author's Note:**

> Specific Warnings: Listen the premise of this fic is that Ratchet walks in mid-interface. You find out that he's known the whole time, but there's definitely a dub-conish elements to the fact that he has been included in something that he ostensibly hasn't consented to. Don't have sex around your friends unless they consent! Don't be Orion and Starscream!
> 
> Also, Orion doesn't have a safe word as much as a near trigger. That ain't safe sane an consensual kids!! Don't be Orion!
> 
> Come yell at me about gay robots on twitter: @floralpunkcfb !!


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